Problematising people management practices: a critical realist study of knowledge sharing

Edwards, Tim ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6034-1948 and Kakavelakis, Konstantinos 2022. Problematising people management practices: a critical realist study of knowledge sharing. Journal of Critical Realism 21 (1) , pp. 46-64. 10.1080/14767430.2021.1992734

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Abstract

Within the field of Human Resource Management (HRM), it is assumed that people management practices, including teamworking and cultural initiatives, enable knowledge sharing because they encourage employees to work collaboratively. Perhaps less well understood are occasions when such efforts fail to deliver knowledge sharing arrangements. Here we employ the critical realist concept of emergence to situate the introduction of people management practices in support of knowledge sharing, to examine how such efforts create the emergent properties to either share or not to share knowledge. Then we refine the critical realist concept of communicative reflexivity to explain why employees decide to engage or withdraw from collaborative work. By focusing on reflexivity as not just an ‘internal dialogue’ but also as an ‘external conversation’ we demonstrate why the situated circumstances of work interactions is a significant form of mediation between social contexts and practice in support (or not) of knowledge sharing.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Business (Including Economics)
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HM Sociology
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis: SSH Journals / Brill Academic Publishers
ISSN:	1476-7430
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	2 November 2021
Date of Acceptance:	10 October 2021
Last Modified:	17 Nov 2023 12:13
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/144773

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